Putin's Daughter

Since Vladimir Putin began cementing his grip on Russia in the 1990s, many of his friends have grown famously rich.

Not so the president himself, say his supporters, who insist Putin is above the money grab that has marked his reign. His public financial disclosures depict a man of modest means. In April, Putin declared an income for 2014 of 7.65 million rubles ($119,000). He listed the ownership of two modest apartments and a share in a car parking garage.

His daughter Katerina (shown above, dancing with Ivan Klimov during the 2014 World Cup Rock'n'Roll Acrobatic Competition in Krakow) is doing considerably better, supported by some of the Russian president’s wealthy friends, a Reuters examination shows.

After unconfirmed media speculation about Katerina’s identity, a senior Russian figure told Reuters that she uses the surname Tikhonova. Andrey Akimov, deputy chairman of Russian lender Gazprombank, said he had met Katerina when she was little and more recently, and that Tikhonova was Putin’s daughter.

Reuters has also learned that earlier this year Katerina, 29, described herself as the “spouse” of Kirill Shamalov, son of Nikolai Shamalov, a longtime friend of the president. Shamalov senior is a shareholder in Bank Rossiya, which U.S. officials have described as the personal bank of the Russian elite.

As husband and wife, Kirill and Katerina would have corporate holdings worth about $2 billion, according to estimates provided to Reuters by financial analysts. That wealth stems mainly from a large publicly disclosed stake in a major gas and petrochemical company that Kirill acquired from Gennady Timchenko, another longtime friend of Putin.

Also among the young couple’s holdings is a seaside villa in Biarritz, France, estimated to be worth about $3.7 million. That asset, too, was acquired by Kirill from Timchenko, a commodities trader who has known the president since at least the 1990s.

Katerina is also thriving in academia and running publicly funded projects at Moscow State University. A Reuters examination of public documents shows that the president’s younger daughter has signed contracts worth several million dollars from state-owned organizations for work at the university to be carried out by organizations she directs. There is no indication she has made any personal financial gain from this work.

She holds a senior position at the university, and helps direct a $1.7 billion plan to expand its campus. Katerina’s official advisers at Moscow State University include five members of Putin’s inner circle – including two former KGB officers who knew her when she was a toddler. They served with her father in the 1980s when he was deployed to Dresden, East Germany.

Putin’s elder daughter, Maria, is linked to Moscow State University as well. She is a graduate of the school’s Fundamental Medicine Department and is forging a career in endocrinology, according to publicly available documents.

Katerina, Maria and Kirill Shamalov all declined to comment for this article. Asked about the Biarritz home, a spokesman for Timchenko said he would not comment on personal matters.

The stock acquisitions, state business deals, French property and oligarch connections offer a rare glimpse into the lives of Putin’s children. The president has been very protective of his private life and his daughters, who seldom appear in the media. The transactions also provide insight into the family finances of Russia’s most powerful man and the elite that has formed around him.

Katerina and Kirill, 33, are among a new generation of Russians enjoying a rapid rise in the wake of their well-connected parents. The phenomenon bears similarities to the “princelings” of China – the children and grandchildren of Communist Party leaders who have gone on to gain positions of power and amass great wealth.

Olga Kryshtanovskaya, a sociologist and former member of Putin’s United Russia political party, told Reuters that a “new aristocracy” was emerging in politics and state companies, with a second generation inheriting the status of the current circle around Putin. “Many in society think they haven’t worked for it, and they question who these people really are,” she said.